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CHAPTER II

Growing Up

AS I REFLECT on my life, I’ve come to realize that folks of my vintage have had the great good fortune to live during the most wonderful, exciting, and fulfilling years that I can imagine. I was born in 1930—September 12 to be exact—in the master bedroom of my parents’ home in the small town of Nelsonville, Ohio, a community of about five thousand people located in the extreme southeastern corner of the state. I joined the Mechem family a little late. My parents already had two children, my brother, Bill, and my sister, Alice. Bill was twelve years older than I and Alice ten. Whether or not I was a mistake or simply an afterthought is irrelevant. Whatever I was, no child could ever have been more loved. I always regarded myself as an “almost” only child. By that I mean that I had all the advantages of being an only child without any of the disadvantages.

My parents were wonderful—bright, hardworking, and with classic Midwestern, small-town values. Mother was the daughter of a coal miner and taught seven grades in a one-room schoolhouse before they married. Dad was the son of the owner of a dry-goods and shoe store, and a veteran of World War I. Mother was devoted to her church, loved music, and laughed easily. Everyone loved her. Dad could be stern and remote but was a great role model because of his work ethic and strong sense of right and wrong. When he was fifty, he was elected to the Ohio State Senate and rose to become President Pro Tem, the second-most powerful position in the state government after the governor. He had a great sense of humor, and his speeches were homespun classics. One of my favorite memories is when I asked Dad at his ninetieth birthday party what had been the most important invention of the ninety years of his life. I was expecting the automobile, electric light, or the telephone. Instead, with a twinkle in his eye he said, “That’s an easy one—indoor plumbing!” I could write another book about my brother and my sister—and perhaps someday I will—but I’ll simply say that they were two of the finest people I have ever known. My brother was a kind, gentle man, who spent much of his life helping others. In later years, he became a lay minister and had his own church in the tiny town of Carbon Hill, Ohio, not far from Nelsonville. When people would ask Bill what he did for a living, he would smile and say, “I marry and bury.” It is unbelievable the number of people I still run into who were either married, baptized, or sent to their eternal reward by my brother, Bill. (Okay, so I don’t actually run into the latter group!) When Bill died we celebrated a very uplifting funeral service, which he had written in its entirety, including scripture readings and songs. So, we did it “his way.” We all miss him very much. My sister, Alice, is still living and still a source of great pride and joy for me. She lost her beloved husband, George, a few years ago, but continues to be healthy and happy living in the same town (Athens, Ohio) and the same house that she and George built shortly after they were married. Alice has a level of intellect and perceptivity that has always amazed me. I really hope that someday I can write that book about Bill and Alice.

Speaking of Bill and Alice brings back a funny memory. Frequently people are asked what is the first thing in their life of which they have any memory. In my case, although the memory is not vivid, it is clearly the first. My parents took my brother, sister, and me to the 1933–1934 Chicago World’s Fair. While I have some general memories of the fairgrounds, my most vivid memory is the image of the “rooming house” in which we stayed. In those days people rented out rooms in their own homes to tourists, and we rented several rooms in such a house. Though I know it is strange, I can see the house in my mind’s eye and recall it as being a very pleasant place to stay.

My brother and sister, however, have much more vivid memories of the World’s Fair—two of which they teased me about for much of my young life. First, I apparently was a “wind bag” even at that early age. They said that, as we walked around the fairgrounds, I would jump up on a bench and, to their great embarrassment, begin making some sort of speech, which I’m sure made little, if any, sense.

The second thing they teased me about was a time when I apparently got very upset by something when we were out in a rowboat on one of the lakes. They took a picture of me standing up in the rowboat crying loudly but holding my fingers to my ears—presumably in the hope that I would not hear myself cry! Bill and Alice always said that, from that moment on, they were worried that I might not be the “brightest bulb in the chandelier.”

NOW DON’T GET me wrong: 1930 was anything but an idyllic year. Indeed, I am not sure that there was anything very idyllic about the decade of the 1930s. The depression lingered on, probably, as historians look in retrospect, until the outbreak of WWII when massive industrial mobilization gave the economy its needed jolt. But I didn’t know very much about this for at least ten years. My dad was a retail merchant and we always had food and clothing and a nice home. It wasn’t until later that I realized how hard Dad and Mother worked to provide these comforts (not, by any means, luxuries). Indeed, they sent my brother and sister to college in 1937 at nearby Ohio University, and everybody (except, of course, me) worked hard to make that happen. As I look back now, my first hint that there might be some gloom in my otherwise cheery environment was when my mother would say, “Charles, when you come home from school, if the big blind on the front living-room window is pulled down, that means your dad has a sick headache … and is resting. So, be especially quiet and let him rest.” I strongly suspect now that those “sick headaches” were migraines brought about by the pressures of running a shoe store when so many people couldn’t afford to buy shoes!

Like most kids, I suspect, I don’t remember a lot about my first five years, except that nothing unpleasant happened and there was a comfortable home and lots of love. That’s about all I need to remember!

MY ELEMENTARY SCHOOL was literally a four- or five-minute walk from our front door. It was called the West School. There was also a Central School and an East School in town. There was no North School or South School—I guess they just didn’t need two more schools! My teachers from the first to the fourth grade were all lovely women (all grade-school teachers in those days were women) and progressively more disciplinarian. My first- and second-grade teachers, I remember so well, seemed always to be hugging us and smiling at us—or with us. As we reached the fourth grade, my teacher, Miss Cook (who was also the principal), was kind, but very stern and strict. Then it was on to the Central School for grades five and six. This, too, was a happy time. My most memorable teacher was also the principal, Mr. Tomlinson. He was an energetic, strong man, much respected by all of us. In a quirk, which I have always remembered fondly, he was also a housepainter. Schoolteachers’ salaries in those days were presumably no better than they are today. Periodically, my mother would hire him to paint our house, either inside or out, and I always helped him. I should probably put help in quotes. He would probably have been quite content to have me watch and not dabble, but that’s not the way of twelve- or thirteen-year-olds!

Then on to junior high school—grades seven and eight. I’ve always thought of junior high school (now referred to as “middle school”—ah! our Anglican heritage!) as an interregnum—in between—yes, a “middle.” One is a bit too old to be young and a bit too young to be old. For me it was a time of discovery, most notably sports and girls. Speaking of girls, I had only one girlfriend during my high school years—a beautiful girl named Rosemarie. We had a lot of fun together, but one activity was far more fun for her than for me. She loved to roller skate and was very good at it. I didn’t like it and therefore wasn’t much good. But, I wanted to be with her as much as possible and tried to learn to roller skate. One night at the skating rink she was taking a rest just outside the iron bar that separated the seating area from the rink, and I was flailing around trying to look graceful. I decided to skate over to where she was sitting and take a rest. Then, tragedy struck. As I got about three or four feet from her and tried to stop, my legs flew up in the air and I fell flat on my back and proceeded to slide under the bar right past Rosemarie and into the wall behind the rink. I decided at that point that if our relationship depended on my prowess as a roller skater, we didn’t have much of a future.

As I’ve mentioned, Nelsonville was a small town. If you wanted to participate in a particular sport, you were welcome—you just did it! So, I played baseball, basketball, football, and ran track. I was not particularly good at any of these, but I was on every team. I was—and am—a great believer in team sports for every young boy and girl. The lessons learned last a lifetime. Three brief stories will tell you all you’ll ever want to know about my “illustrious” sporting career.

First, I almost drowned on the football field during a game. I repeat: I almost drowned on the football field. It happened this way. In the middle of the game there was a virtual cloudburst, a torrential rain that lasted for a half hour or so. Of course, football games don’t get cancelled for bad weather, so the game went on. Our quarterback called an end-around play in which I was the lead blocker. Ironically, the trouble started when I made a really good block. I hit this big, tall left end below the knees, and he fell like a tree. Unfortunately, most of him fell on my head and shoulders, pushing my nose into one of the many huge puddles of water that had formed on the field. I remember thinking, “What a stupid way to go—drowning on a football field!” I held my breath but it seemed that the big guy would never get up. He finally did. I came up sputtering and rubbing mud out of my eyes but otherwise intact.

The second of my great sports moments also came in a football game. Our regular quarterback got banged up a little and the coach took him out for a few plays. I was the substitute quarterback and not a very good one. The first play I called was a run-around end with me carrying the ball. As I made my turn to go around the end, I saw four huge guys from the other team waiting to annihilate me. So I kept running towards the sideline and must have also run backwards because in the next day’s newspaper was the following quote describing this play: “Substitute quarterback Mechem was tackled for a ten-yard loss while he was fading to pass.” I really didn’t realize how far and wide (and back!) I must have retreated that it looked like I was “fading” to pass. Thank God our regular quarterback re-entered the game soon.

The final story occurred in a basketball game. We had a pretty good team in my senior year, and we advanced to post-season play where we were scheduled to play one of the top teams in the state. The game was played on the Ohio University basketball court, a large facility quite unlike the one on which we played our home games in Nelsonville. We had a very small gym that actually doubled as the stage for the high school auditorium. Just imagine—the back part of the foul circle was only a few feet from the centerline! I was very nervous as the game began because we had never played a team this good. We kept up for a while but then began to fall back. Our coach told us in a timeout that anytime our center or forwards got a rebound, I was to “fast break” towards our basket, and they were to throw the ball to me. We had done this scores of times, and the timing for it was pretty well burnt into my brain. Well, the moment came, our center took the ball off the backboard, I broke for the basket, and he threw the ball to me. I caught the ball, took the two or three steps that I was used to taking in the Nelsonville gym, and then went up for what I thought would be an easy layup. There was only one problem. The court was dramatically longer than the one I was used to so that when I went up in the air for the easy layup I was about thirty feet from the basket. Obviously, a layup was not in the cards, but I was already in the air, and as I recall I simply threw the ball at the basket. It was really all I could do. I completely missed the basket, and I came down thoroughly embarrassed. One of my more humbling moments, especially because it was in front of a large crowd.

I could write yet another book (probably more than one) about the rest of my high school years. But, again, this is not my autobiography. Suffice it to say, my high school years were happy. At that time, the world (well, at least the United States) was a very happy place. The war was over, the depression had been wiped out in the tsunami of the war’s industrial might, reconstruction of much of the world had begun, and “terrorism” was a word and a practice that did not exist yet.

BEFORE MOVING ON to the next chapter in my life, let me mention two pieces of my early life that had significant impact many years later.

When I was a little boy growing up in Nelsonville, one of my most eagerly anticipated events was the yearly visit of Gooding’s Traveling Carnival. This was a carnival of the 1930–1940s era complete with rides (none of which would have passed OSHA muster), games (very few of which one could ever win), sideshows, and food of every kind. Because the carnival used land directly behind my dad’s shoe store and he only charged a small amount of rent, Dad always got a lot of free tickets, which he passed on to me. I went every night with my pals and loved it.

This deep-seated love of the carnival reasserted itself in a most unexpected way many years later. While I was CEO of Taft Broadcasting Company, one of our areas of expansion was the themed-amusement park business. We moved in that direction after acquiring the Hanna-Barbera Productions company in 1966. In thinking about ways to enhance the Hanna-Barbera image, it wasn’t much of a stretch to see what Disney had done in their parks to merchandise the popularity of their cartoon characters. Therefore, we decided to build a large theme park just north of Cincinnati, named Kings Island. As an aside, I might note that the park was a success from the beginning and is an even greater success today—some forty years after it was opened.

While I firmly believed in the soundness of the business venture, I have to admit that I was overjoyed at my opportunity to reassert my “carney love.” Marilyn, the kids, and I visited the construction site several times every week for two years and literally watched it emerge from the ground. As the park was nearing completion and the thrill rides were being tested, I made a point to ride on all of them as soon as the builders of the rides would let me. It is probably a bit of a stretch to say that I was a test pilot, but I certainly tried out the rides long before they were open to the public.

Not long after the park opened, the Wall Street Journal did a front-page story about the park and made numerous references to my enthusiasm for the project. It was a very favorable article, but there was one phrase that made me the butt of many jokes. The author, knowing of my love for the thrill rides, described me as a “roller-coaster nut.” I suppose one could wish for a more distinguished description when appearing on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, but I loved it, and I certainly couldn’t argue with its accuracy.

So, I guess the moral of the story is “once a carney boy, always a carney boy.”

SINCE WE WERE growing up in the depression, my brother, sister, and I were all expected to have a job when we were not in school. When I was old enough to have a “real” job, my dad talked to the County Engineer and got me a summer job with the County Highway Department. Athens County, where Nelsonville is located, was a rural county with many dirt roads that the county was obligated to maintain. The work crew was a group of fellows of all ages and backgrounds. Some of them had worked for the Highway Department for many years; others were guys who were probably just trying to make a living while looking for a better job.

This was hot, tiring work, but at my age, it took a lot to wear me out. I dug ditches, repaired guardrails, cut brush, cleaned culverts, and did whatever else I was told to do. The older guys were really nice to me, and I honestly enjoyed the work. However, as I think back, I probably enjoyed it largely because I knew it would end in late August, and I would go back to school! By the way, the pay was extravagant—65 cents an hour! But to me at that age and time, it was a fortune.

I learned two very important lessons during the four summers that I was with the “Highway Boys.” First, as I just mentioned, my work was temporary, and I was young and looking to the future. But most of the guys I worked with were in a very different category. This was their life. This is how they supported themselves and their families. For most of them this was their future. It gave me a new and different perspective on the lives and dreams of what, I suspect, was the vast majority of people at that time.

The other lesson I learned came from an old guy who was very friendly to me from the very beginning. His name was Emmett, and he had been part of the highway gang for many years. He was an intelligent, pleasant man and very popular with all of us. He and I were working together one day to dig a trench for some pipe. He watched me stabbing furiously at the ground with my shovel and stopped me to give me some advice. He showed me how to shovel slowly and carefully and taught me all the tricks of the trade. He was obviously proud of the fact that he could do something well and that he could pass this knowledge on to someone else. This may seem a trivial incident, but it had a real effect on me both then and now. No matter how menial a task may seem, it can be done well or it can be done badly; it can be done with pride or with resentment; it can be done with total effort or with disdain. I think that lesson applies—or should apply—to any task that anyone ever undertakes. It’s funny how and where you learn important lessons!

I can’t leave my highway gang experiences without noting my hopelessly unsuccessful attempt to learn to chew tobacco. Most of the guys chewed tobacco partly, I’m sure, for the nicotine fix but also because it kept their mouths moist during the hot, dry, and dusty days that followed one after the other, especially in July and August. I thought it would be “cool” to chew, and I planned to brag about it to my pals. Regrettably, it never happened. Let me tell you that there is an art to chewing tobacco, as surprising as that may seem. The trick is to do it without swallowing any of the tobacco juice that is generated by chewing. This is obviously foul stuff and spoils all the fun! Try as I might I could never master it. I guess this just proves that there is skill required in this ancient habit, and it was a skill that I simply did not possess!*

I graduated from Nelsonville High School in 1948. There were fifty-two of us in the graduating class. It was truly a wonderful group of kids. We got along wonderfully well together, and I still count many of them among the closest friends I have ever had.

My mother and dad on their honeymoon at Niagara Falls in 1916.

Yes, that’s me!

My dad, grandfather, and uncle in front of the family shoe store.

My mother and her one-room schoolhouse class. Note the number of bare feet!

Dad, as President Pro Tem of the Ohio Senate, with Governor Jim Rhodes.

In spite of a weak link (me), we had a pretty good basketball team. I’m in the first row, second from the right.

My brother, Bill, my dad, me, my sister, Alice, and her husband, George, on the occasion of my receiving an Honorary Doctorate at Ohio University in 1984.

The four horsemen we ain’t! I’m number 13—seems fitting.